What are the 4 stages of digestion?

The four stages of digestion are:

Ingestion: This is the process of taking food into the mouth.

Digestion: There are two types of digestion:

Mechanical digestion: Physical breakdown of food into smaller pieces by chewing and stomach churning.
Chemical digestion: Breakdown of large molecules into smaller molecules by enzymes. This primarily occurs in the mouth, stomach, and small intestine.
Absorption: The process by which nutrients are absorbed from the digested food into the bloodstream or lymphatic system through the walls of the intestine.

Excretion: The removal of undigested or unabsorbed food residues and waste products from the body, primarily through defecation.

These stages work together to ensure that nutrients are extracted from food and waste products are eliminated efficiently from the body.